Politics, in the small ‘p’ social sense, is a dynamic rarely discussed in football.
However, former Premier League Golden Boot winner Kevin Phillips believes there was an element of that in Carlo Ancelotti’s decision to reinstate Jordan Pickford to Everton’s starting line-up at the weekend.
Speaking to Football Insider, Kevin Phillips praised Ancelotti’s “very clever man management skills” by reverting Robin Olsen on the bench for the 3-1 defeat to Manchester United.
Sweden international Olsen put in a good performance in a narrow 2-1 loss against Newcastle after he replaced Pickford following a string of high-profile issues for the England ‘keeper, who has come under fire for a reckless lunge which left Liverpool defender Virgil van Dijk ruled out for the remainder of the season.
Despite the 1-3 defeat on Saturday, Ancelotti offered a positive view of his goalkeeper and insisted that he could have done “nothing” with United’s goals.
When asked whether Pickford starting against United was the right call, Phillips leapt to Ancelotti’s defence, saying:
“It is great man management from Carlo Ancelotti.
“As much as Olsen was asked to play against Newcastle, deep down he will have known that he was coming in for one game and one game only. Ancelotti would have spoken with him.
“Jordan is their number one goalkeeper and unless he gets injured or continues his bad form then he will be the number one.
“Yesterday, was a chance for Jordan to show everyone what he was all about.
“It was very clever man management skills, taking him out of the limelight. It is unfortunate for Olsen but he has to get used to that.”
Read Everton Verdict
It certainly was a shrewd move by Ancelotti to appease Pickford by making clear he is still the number one choice. However, Olsen has proven to be a dependable option in goal, putting pressure on Pickford to start keeping clean sheets and reduce the frequency of errors from his game.
If Pickford fails to step up, Ancelotti may have to make the tough call of dropping him longer-term for the good of the team.
